That wiley Elon Musk and his obtuse tweets have caused a stir of attention today. The tweet said there’d be a big announcement on Thursday (now apparently changed until next Tuesday) in which Elon would be putting his money where his mouth is. And I don’t think he’s talking about stuffing his mouth full of $100 bills.
Really exciting @TeslaMotors
announcement coming on Thursday. Am going to put my money where my mouth is in v major way.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 25, 2013

A little later he added this:
Slight change of date to ensure no end of quarter distractions — will be Tues next week.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 26, 2013

The tweet immediately caused the TSLA stock price to jump, and a bunch of news articles were written trying to guess what the announcement would be. My own attempt at Elon Musk Kremlinology came to these possibilities:-
- Taking Tesla Private (unlikely)
- Doing another round of fundraising, to pay off the Dept of Energy loans immediately (unlikely)
- More expansion of the Supercharger network (likely)
- Tesla Motors actually was profitable in Q1 2013 as predicted (unlikely)
- Clarifying the “500 deliveries a week” announcement made last week (unlikely)
- Buying Fisker Automotive (unlikely)
Okay, put me down for an expansion of the Supercharger network.
But while we’re here peeking at Musks’ tweets there are a few others he’s made over the last month or so that are worthy of our attention.
Am in Oslo to thank the Norwegian customers of @TeslaMotors
personally. Highest Model S orders per capita in the world.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 6, 2013

This one is interesting because of a later tweet sent to Elon Musk
@elonmusk
how would one of your EVs perform in a cold (wisconsin) climate?
— Jacob Meicher (@jbmeicher) March 23, 2013

Which was answered this way:
.@jbmeicher
Model S works great in cold. Highest sales/capita are in Norway and we have a ton of customers in Canada.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2013

But he did not answer queries of this sort:-
@elonmusk
@jbmeicher
Any plans to build a pick up / SUV version? Interested…
— Bryan Baeumler (@Bryan_Baeumler) March 23, 2013

@elonmusk
@jbmeicher
And what about a smallish SUV? Any time soon?
— Carolyn Porco (@carolynporco) March 23, 2013

Another query was about the plan to build a lower priced electric car:-
@elonmusk
Is there any plan to produce a Tesla car comparable to a lower-end sports car than these high-end cars? Like in the $40k range?
— Josh J (@joshj_gt) March 23, 2013

Tesla’s code name for this is Bluestar and was originally scheduled for 2015, but that is no doubt delayed. What Elon answered is this:-
.@joshj777
It has always been my dream to produce a low cost, compelling electric car. We are 3 to 4 years away. Wish it could be sooner.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 23, 2013

The 3-4 year time frame is about 2017ish, then. Note that the Model X introduction has been delayed for a year (see Tesla SEC filing reveals Model X electric SUV production delayed until 2014).
A later question, following up that answer, asked:-
@elonmusk
will this future $30k car be missing a lot which the Model S has? affordable vehicle or luxury made affordable?
— Michael Lindahl (@MichaelLindahl) March 24, 2013

To which Elon replied:-
@MichaelLindahl
It will be slightly smaller w fewer features as std. Think Audi A4 or BMW 3 vs Model S being S7 or M5
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2013


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